


frost has painted my lips blue

by baichan



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Crossdressing, FTM, Gen, Gender Dysphoria, Gender Issues, Genderfuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-24
Updated: 2013-06-13
Packaged: 2017-11-22 05:57:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/606541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baichan/pseuds/baichan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The moon has given him a new chance, a new life but the Guardians are unaware until the nightmares of his fear plagues him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

She comes out of the water with heavy skirts and long hair.

The dress she wears is wool and leather and it drapes annoyingly from her waist. Long white locks fall out of a braid she doesn't remember weaving.

These are things she hates as she makes her way to the town she saw from the sky. She walks there because it's hard to be in the air even though it's fun. Her clothes weigh her down and her hair tangles in branches that pull and grab like hands.

When she gets there no one sees her.

But she sees them.

And she watches.

She watches the women cook and clean and sew and sometimes help the men. Their mundane chores bore her but she studies them like a child discovering that not everyone's body is the same.

The woman have marks on their hands, burns from cooking and little scars given by needle mishaps and slips.

Her hands have these small imperfections and she hates them, an unreasonable feeling of disgust stirs in her gut and she kind of feels like crying, like screaming at the world for wrongs she doesn't really understand. She doesn't scream because no one would hear her anyway.

The men have calluses and scars from knives and fish lines and rope.

It surprises her that she has those too, just a few of them but it's a pleasant warmth that spreads in the bottom of her belly and something that feels right, that makes her giddy and light. So she stops watching the curious creatures that flutter around in skirts like her, with long hair like her's, and she begins studying the men.

They work hard work and laugh deep, brash laughs and curse loudly when their wives don't look.

They hold shepherd's hooks and fishing poles and carry shovels and axes.

It takes her three heart beats to realize she wants that.

She doesn't know where to begin.

But she tries, she follows them, she curses, and steals sips of whisky, and when someone makes a rude remark she laughs with as deep a voice as she can.

Then she realizes she could do more.

One night she slips into a house and finds the woman of said home's sewing basket. She grabs it.

The skirt she hates is ripped with scissors she 'borrowed' and she sews the pieces together with more stolen tools. A part of her is disgusted to be sewing, to know where and how to cut, but she does it and she pulls on pants and she's happy. For a moment she's happy.

She returns the basket but keeps the scissors.

The men keep their hair shorter, or at least the youth do.

She watches from a window as a mother brushes a hand through her sons hair and then cuts. Her eyes observe with almost perverse fascination as lock after lock falls to the floor. The weight of her stolen scissors hang heavily in the pocket of her pants. Hands runs through white hair.

She could do that.

Flying is easier with her legs free so she lets the wind carry her.

Her hair is the only thing that protests, whipping about wildly. It frustrates her. The wind drops her gently on her lake so she takes out the scissors and cuts.

She snips and cuts until it's to her shoulders then she pauses and looks down. White hair is by her feet but she sees something else.

She sees her silhouette in the light of the moon.

Carefully she starts to snip away until its to her ear.

When she stops she feels strange. The moon is bright and she sees herself, pants tight on her slim legs her cloak draped around her body, hiding her small chest. Her shirt does the same.

The moon creates a circle of light and she sees her face with a strange clarity that's not a normal reflection for ice. Her face is slender but angular and her hair is short.

She looks like a boy.

The moon fades and she feels something break and fix inside her.

She cries and hands pull at hair that's not there.

She'll miss it, she realizes. She loved her hair but it's not her.

It's not his.

Looking up the moon speaks.

Jack Frost

It's not a special name, exactly two beats long and it sounds like snow, falling and packed and crunched beneath boots, but it's his and in the night he wails out for the loss of her hair and beats against the chest that's not quite right. Jack Frost isn't her name but it's his.


	2. Chapter 2

It's been years and he hasn't really thought about his body. There's no time for it when there is snow to bring and children to play with and the wind to accompany.

Jack, it whispers to him, it's not important.

It twirls around him and pulls him to play.

Tonight he kisses it good evening and goes to the bed North has given him, in the room North has given him.

He has a home now. A family.

Old insecurities that died in solitude spring up, but they don't matter. He is Jack Frost.

Something glints on his nightstand. The tooth box is alight in the glow of a lamp.

Jacqueline.

Your name.

He turns and gasps.

She is standing there, she has long hair that goes past her waist and frames a feminine face. She has a dress that hangs delicately on a feminine form.

She smiles.

Flowers, lilies, are woven in a chain upon her head. Delicate leaves and stems, big blooms.

She's beautiful and he realizes that he's jealous. It's irrational and fades with a sense of wrong. He's not a woman.

Jacqueline Lily Frost

The name falls from slender lips painted with shadows and frost.

"My name's Jack Frost."

Have you forgotten?

Her lips curl cruelly around the words and she points at the golden memories.

He shakes his head.

"That's not me anymore."

She smiles at him and approaches him.

He steps backwards and stumbles on the bed.

She takes delicate steps and looks like she's floating. He's jealous and he realizes it's because she has a grace that will never be his.

It belonged to his mother. It was never his.

"I'm not you. I was never you."

The nightmare's face twists. It's ugly and sharp toothed and black sand. It lunges, and pierces him with sharp hands.

He cries out.

You think they'll accept you? 

The hands twist cruelly in him. Sharp, sharp weapons. Sharp, sharp words.

They won't understand.

He screams.

The door bangs open and he hears cursing in Russian and then the metallic swipe of familiar blades.

"Jack!"

Rough hands grab him and pull gently at his torn hoodie.

He's crying and he grabs the hands.

"N-no! St-stop it! Pl-please."

"Jack calm down."

Feminine hands touch his face and they remind him of his mother.

He shakes, his body shakes as he bleeds, his head shakes as he tries to pry the big hands off of him.

"Calm down mate! We're jus' tryin' to 'elp."

Soft paws grab at his kicking legs.

A shuffle of sand dances in his vision.

He calms, body relaxing as he sees himself, him and his little brother, twirling as they play about in gold sand.

"Pip." he breathes out and the hands pause in their pulling and smoothing and holding.

Philip Frost, Pip.

He smiles dazedly and forget's why he was protesting.

Big hand's carefully pull at his hoodie until it's off and then he's left in the puffy shirt that's soaked in his blood.

He can barely hear his brother's voice.

"Jacqueline!"

Pip hadn't quite understood but when he had asked to be called Jack, but Pip had done it.

"Jack."

Tears fall down his face gently and he wraps his too slender fingers around the big hands that paused.

North knows.

Jack doesn't think the others do. They're still soothing and holding.

"Stop." he sobs out.

North does. He pulls his hands away and Jack watches as he backs away.

"Bunny. Sandy." he motions for them to follow him.

Bunny doesn't move but now Jack can see him.

He's holding his legs and sitting on the bed beside them, one paw strokes now that he stopped struggling.

"Mate, you mus' be off you're rocka if ya think I'm leavin' him."

Sandy floats in a tinkle of sand to North, smiling encouragingly at him.

Sandy's always known he thinks.

He probably knows what the nightmare truly was.

"Bunny!"

North looks mad, his brow furrowed.

Jack sobs, face collapsed in desperation.

Don't he thinks, don't hate me.

Tooth is still stroking, even as Bunny hops up and leaves with Sandy.

North's face softens slightly as he gives Jack one last look before closing the door.

Tooth stares at it for a second before snapping her attention to Jack.

Immediately she pulls off his puffy old shirt. He lets her, sitting up and lifting his arms.

She gasps.

The wounds are bleeding slowly as Tooth quickly applies pressure.

Jack stares up at her soft, feminine face as purple eyes scour his body.

He knows his ribs are visible, his skin is pale, and his breasts are small round things that he hates.

"Jack." she croons.

He shakes his head.

"Oh Jack."

She cleans his wounds of black sand and then wraps them tight.

Leaning down she kisses his forehead.

"Oh, Jack," she whispers as his vision swims out, "It's alright."


	3. Chapter 3

He wakes and Tooth is by the window whispering to fairies that flutter around her, they peak at him but keep their distance.

"-got that?"

They fairies chirp quietly and nod, leaving to do whatever it is their queen told them.

Tooth looks at him.

"Oh! Jack!"

He still has no shirt on but a blanket was lain over his chest.

He stares at her, unsure of what to say. She happily fills the silence.

"I had to change your bandages a few time but you're fine now. You were out for a while but your body started to frost over the wounds so I wasn't that worried."

"How long?" he asks, voice strained.

"Oh it's almost morning don't worry, you weren't out too long"

She flutters over him.

"The others are worried though, especially Bunny."

Jack stares at her achingly feminine face.

"I'm not a girl."

Tooth's face crunches slightly in confusion but then relaxes.

Falling gently to the ground her wings fall behind her.

"You're Jack."

Jack nods and sits up, keeping the blanket to his chest.

Standing slowly with Tooth flitting nervously besides him he reaches the dresser and opens it.

There are sweaters and he grabs the thickest one that he see. Dropping the blanket he quickly slips it on.

His staff is laid against the dresser too and he grabs it and then using it as a crutch he makes his way to the door, Tooth by his side.

She opens the door for him and they make their way to the sound of a fire.

 

Bunny's curled up by the fire, yellow sand swirling above his head. His ears twitch and he jumps up, sand dissipating as it falls around him.

"Jack!" He calls out.

Bunny examines him, nose sniffing.

"You gave us'a righ' scare, mate." he says, paws smoothing Jack's shoulders.

Jack grabs the furry appendages, not wanting Bunny to come upon something unexpected.

A door opens and North steps out of his office, Sandy following.

"Geez, wha' I miss?"

North crosses his arms and gives Jack a stern look.

"Apparently we 'ave things to discuss."

He gestures to the door but Jack just shrugs.

"Everyone but Bunny knows."

Bunny tilts his head, drawing his hands away.

"Okay, seriously, 'hat I miss?"

Jack has the fleeting thought of lifting his shirt and giving Bunny another 'righ' scare' but that would mean flashing North who's like a father figure and really, Jack would rather no one see him without his shirt. He doesn't like to acknowledge that part of him.

Jack twitches as he thinks of how to say it.

Sighing he sits on the floor and invites the others to join him.

"Bunny, have you ever seen a man dressed as a woman, or a woman dressed as a man?"

Bunny's ears flop and his brow furrows in confusion.

"Well, ya, the' need 'ope a lot, but wha' does...?"

Bunny pauses and reaches a paw out hesitantly.

"Oh, mate ya don' mean...?"

Jack nods, curling his shoulders protectively inwards.

The Aussie sighs and touches Jack's shoulder, smoothing his back.

"It's a'right mate." he whispers.

North sighs and Jack watches him out of the edge of his vision.

"You are male, here," he taps his head, "da?"

Jack lifts his head, nodding.

"But, your body's female?"

Jack nods stiffly, wanting to deny it but knowing that there's no use.

North gets up with a groan, mumbling as he makes his way to his private office. There's shuffling and a dull 'thud'. Then he returns, a thick book in his hands.

"I think I can help."

Jack gasps, eyes wide and mouth open. He flies up with a gust of wind who celebrates with him.

"You can?" he asks.

"You can fix me?"

He sees North's face crumple slightly and he hears a flutter of feathers.

"Jack," Tooth says, "you're not broken."

Jack shakes his head because he's always been a broken creature. Cracked and fragmented since he came out of the lake, since he put on pants and cut his hair, since he looked in his memories and discovered it's always been like this.

Bunny's paws grab at his hand and he feels a rush of hope, it's green and lush and stirs something inside him, because there's hope.

North can fix him.

He looks up, and stares into North's eyes, a grin stretches across his face.

"It would be the best Christmas gift ever."

North smiles and there's a twinkle in his eyes that is one part joy two parts wonderment and three parts exhilaration.

He must not be able to do this for others, children that Jack's seen that sit by windows and kneel by beds, children who wish and pray that they were different, that they had or didn't have hair like they did, faces like they did, bodies like they did.

North sets the book down and flips the old pages delicately. Dust rises from between the pages bound together.

"I just ask one favor."

Jack leans back on the balls of his feet, the wind blows and doesn't let him fall.

It never does.

"Anything."


	4. Chapter 4

Anything turns out to be cruel and twisted.

He is dressed as a she.

Dresses his family were never able to afford, laid out across his bed, beautiful and the perfect size.

Jack wanted to rip them to shreds by their seams. Wants to rip off the ribbons and lace and flowers and bows.

He doesn't because they were a gift and an excess one at that from North.

Jack holds one of the many dresses (enough to fill a wardrobe) and is torn between hating the fact that it was January. If it had been closer to Christmas then North would be too busy to make dresses. Rubbing the fabric with his thumb he thinks that on the flipside North wouldn't have time to make the potion to fix him.

(Despite Tooth and North and Bunny and Sandy'sprotest he still believed he was broken.)

The potion actually helped a lot. Anything was worth being fixed, and deep down he knows it's for his own good, to be sure that this is truly what he wants, the wish that could set him free if granted. There is actually a small part of him that's scared. As much as he hates his body hates being female and hates how wrong everything feels, he's scared.

What if it doesn't fix it?

What if I'm just broken?

He ignores the voice that whispers doubt and fear as black as twirling sucking holes in the universe.

He tells himself that they just want to put him in a dress. He tells himself they just want a good laugh or to see if he's really a girl. He tells himself that they just want to know who Jacquelyne Frost is.

So he goes along with it, anything to be able to shed his skin and be the person Jack Frost should be.

He slips a glacier blue one on. A simple creation with elbow-length puffy sleeves and a modest neckline. It hangs a little heavy past his knees and halfway to his feet. It's a slightly older styled dress and he picks it because it's reminiscent of something his mother would've liked. It also hides underweight body that he's kept from the few prying eyes that have cared to look.

Looking in the full mirror he takes a barefooted step toward the image of a lady. He has the grace of a cat or a bird, unnatural to any human, male or female, and slightly feral, the way he holds himself though, it shatters the image completely leaving the dress to cut painfully at his soul.

He wants to break the mirror, it gives him false hope of a pretty image as fragile as eggshells ruined by every step. He's not a woman even in a dress but it's all alright because soon, so soon that his lips crave it and his fingers shake and his chest heaves. Because everything he wants is right there and all he has to do is wait.

Only for week, North had said, heck, less than week for me and yetis to gather supplies for potion.

North had rested his big calloused hand on his slender bony shoulder.

Then, then you'll be man, he had removed his hand and smiled at Jack, for now though you are woman.

Jack shakes his head. You can dress a boy in dresses, didn't make him any less of a boy.

He walks to the door in steps that aren't truly feminine or girly in any way.


	5. Chapter 5

They look and he fidgets. Their stares weighing down on him and he wonders if he looks feminine, looks like he belongs in dresses and skirts.

He doesn't want to, they cling and weigh him down like shoes and gloves and hats. They aren't for him. This isn't for him.

They don't say anything and the silence lays layers upon layers of tension in the air. It's heavy and leaves cotton in his mouth.

His arms are shaking and he feels a soft sort of chill that hasn't touched his skin in so long. 

He feels wrong.

Wings buzz, pink and light as Tooth zooms towards him.

"Oh, Jack! You look so pretty!" 

Jack smiles but it feels sharp like broken ice and empty pools of freezing water. Sharp and fractured, he shivers. 

He never liked dresses that wieghed you down, made it hard to move your legs, to kick, to swim as everything turned to icy pinpricks and you couldn't feel anything, numbness spreading like frost through your veins as the heavy skirts weigh you down, down, down.

Swallowing and clenching and unclenching his hands he looks at Tooth. Really studies her face, dissecting it for emotion.

She looks so concerned. It's in her eyes drowning in the unnaturally purple eyes, but her face is forming happiness, a probing sort that's just testing the waters. 

Too hot or too cold?

But that means - that means she's concerned.

That means she wants him to be happy.

He bites his lip, and his hands are shaking as they move slowly to his face.

This is how she drowns.

He can feel it, the broken pieces in his heart and the lace and skirts and ribbons that keep them apart, the long hair that he loved but maybe on someone else, and his body that's too curvy with too much fat and not enough muscle.

He's wrong. She's wrong.

His body quivers as tears fall and he wipes them up because boys shouldn't cry but he's not a boy is he?

He hunches and feels slender hands on his back smoothing and a feminine voice whispering harshly in reprimand.

The voice, Tooth's voice, is speaking to him now, gentle words whispered directly to his ear.

"It's okay sweetie."

Bigger paws are helping to soothing him as he tries to reel in his silent tears and the way sobs are bubbling up his throat.

"Mate, ca'm down, 't's gonna be o'kay. North's a stup'd drongo."

A hysterical sob makes it past his lips, but it's more of a laugh.

"He'll h've that p'tion in no t'me, mate."

Jack breathes in, one long breath and the Wind shake the whole building.

He can hear its cries and calls for him, it's screaming for him, wanting to make him okay.

Making a break from the kind hands and words he crashes through the shutters and glass of a window.

The Wind picks him up happily, and nudges him as it carries him aimlessly away. 

Where to? It asks from the gentle nudges.

The Wind twirls him, keeps the dress glued to his legs and Jack giggles as it rips it a little.

"Home!" He calls out, even of its with a heavy heart.

He just needs to be home.

 

The lake, his lake, her lake, is quiet, snow is falling in reaction to his turmoil and presence.

It's gentle and calm and slow like the tears falling from his face.

This is where it all began, where she drowned and woke up and where he changed, changed his hair and his clothes and his whole self even though no one was there to see. It didn't matter, it was all for himself. No one else.

He sits, legs crossed and staff in front of him on the ice surface. Trees grow all around and they're lightly dusted with snow. The familiar sight calms him, soothes his quivering limbs and stops the gentle tears.

His brother wouldn't recognize him, but it doesn't matter. Pip is dead by now, hopefully living a long life, hopefully happy, and Jack really hopes with happy children.

The shadows stretch until they touch him and he shivers.

Do you remember it? The growing shadow doppelgänger of her asks.

"It was cold and we were alone." They say in sync.

It was dark. The doppelgänger says, her long hair swishing in a disturbingly similar way to oil twirling in water.

"Oh, Jack, don't you see? I was with you before Moon was." An equally oily voice says.

A hand, light in weight but heavy in wants and expectations.

Even hope.

The doppelgänger in front of him changes. The hair grows shorter, the face becomes leaner, the figure more lean and straight. 

It's him.

Suddenly the Moon shines bright and the shadows receed to the shelter of the trees. The doppelgänger shows its true face, a Fearling screaming, a crude figure of what it used to be, a child, obliterating and shriveling in the light.

"But then the Moon shone down on me," He says, face turned up to beautiful light, "and it rescued me from the cold and the dark and eventually, from being alone."

He hears screams of refusal calling to him but they fade like the shadows and the darkness in the face if light.

"Jack?" A new voice calls.

Getting up quickly Jack backs into the shelter of the trees and their shadows. Shadows that claw gently at his clothes and skin and hair, even as the wind blows them away and into the light.

"Jamie?"


	6. Chapter 6

Jamie steps into the Moon's light, fear and uncertainty peeling away from his face.

"I heard the Wind and she was carrying you here."

That makes Jack's heart swell with pride, he had been teaching Jamie the language of the Wind but it was difficult, especially since the Wind only _speaks_ to him. Maybe the Wind made an exception tonight.

"The Wind doesn't have a gender Jamie." He says laughingly as Jamie sits on the ice, all wrapped up in heavy jackets and winter boots.

Jack hits his staff on the ice and watches as an extra layer of frost spreads out.

The magic, blue in all its winter wonder must shine enough light for Jamie to see him.

"Jack?" Jamie asks again, wide eyed.

Jack swallows and steps out, torn dress and all.

"Jamie, would you like to hear the story of how I became Jack Frost?"

Jamie nods slowly even as his eyes flicker from skirts to sleeves to face to barely there curves.

He's only eleven so Jack doesn't really bother to be upset about it.

Sitting across from him Jack lays his staff between them.

"I had a little brother, Pip."

Jamie's eyes widen further.

"We were skating and the ice cracked."

He puts his hand on the lake and ice is covered in another layer of frost.

"I saved him but fell in myself. It was cold and dark and I was alone but the Moon saved me."

His fingers move to the torn bottom of the skirt.

"I cut my hair and you should have seen it, it was so long and white, I changed into pants."

Jack looks into Jamie's eyes.

"I never corrected anybody when they easily assumed I was a boy. That's want I _wanted_ to be. I wanted to be _Jack Frost._

"Do you understand?"

Jamie nodded mouth parted open in wonder, his little hands reaching out to grab Jack's.

"You're Jack Frost."

Jack smiles sadly.

"Not always, but I had always wanted to be, and that's who the Moon told me I was."

Jamie smiles at him.

"I... I think I understand."

Jack smiles, the pieces in his heart, the invisible shattered shards move and connect.

"I believe you're Jack Frost."

I believe in you.

_I believe, I believe, I believe._

Jamie hugs him and Jack clutches him to his chest, tears pricking in his eyes as he thinks, this is what it's like to be whole.

 

Before he left, Jamie asked what his name had been, it was a childish curiosity so Jack answered easily.

_Jacqualine Lily Frost._

Jamie smiled in a sweet if not slightly mischievous smile.

"Will you be here tomorrow morning?"

Jack promised he would be.

Now it was tomorrow and morning and Jack listened as the soft crunching of boots on his snow came close.

In Jamie's hands was a chain of lilies, more colorful than what should be found in winter.

"My mom bought them but Sophie's allergic so I asked her if I could bring them to a friend."

He holds it out for Jack to take and Jack does, the color draining out of them leaving them white and blue as he touches them.

_It's his kiss hello and his kiss goodbye._

"I had Cupcake help me."

The delicate chain, now sturdier thanks to his magic and frost rests easily between his fingers.

Jamie understands, he thinks, if not entirely than he gets the gist of it all.

Jack loves the delicate chain, a mix of childish affection and his own magic. Gently he hands it back to Jamie who stares in wonder at the frost ferns that creep from where his fingertips had touched them.

Bending down he mock bows, staff in one hand like a scepter.

"Oh young believer, will you do the honor of crowning me, Jack Frost, Guardian of Fun and Shepherd of Winter?"

He hears more than sees Jamie's delighted giggle as he places the crown of lilies upon his head.

Standing he smiles brightly at the Last Light.

"Thank you."

Jamie smiles back.

"I think it would look better if you had your jacket and pants back."

Jack chuckles, and turns to see his reflection in the ice.

"I think you're right."

Giving him one last hug he waves goodbye to Jamie.

 

He comes back to them after the night he spent at his home, the place where he was born and where he's killed his fear, destroyed it to nothing but light and snow and fun.

He returns crowned as Guardian of Fun, Shepherd of Winter, and Frost Child.

He can do this.

His footsteps are light against the sill of his window.

The dresses were gone, pretty little things that he would have wished on someone who could appreciate them more. Maybe they would be some good little girl's Christmas present.

His normal outfit of a sweatshirt and the pants he had made were laid out. He changes and looks in the mirror to consider his form and the crown of lilies upon his head before the frost stretches out over his reflection.

Turning, he silently creeps out to look for the others.

They're in a living room, one of many with a fireplace and candles and soft sofas.

North is asleep on an armchair, cups that smell strongly of vodka sit along with an empty bottle. Bunny is laid out in front of the fireplace, shivering with every breath. Sandy is drifting and dozing and Tooth is flitting to her fairies as quietly as she can in a corner.

Suddenly one of her baby fairies chirp loudly and buzz around him, it's mother following quickly.

"Oh Jack," she whispers softly, "we were so worried."

Frost coats her ruffled feathers. They had been looking for him.

"I'm sorry." He says as she pulls him into a warm hug.

She shakes her head and holds him closely.

"It's not your fault."

Jack smiles even as gentle tears roll silently down his face.

Furry paws join the hug and then sand tinkles around in a tight grip. Last to join is North and by then tears come freely and Jack's eyes feel like pregnant storm clouds.

"I love you guys." He whispers softly.


	7. Chapter 7

The potion is a rich green color like poisonous plants deep in the Amazon or venomous reptiles that hiss and slither. It makes Jack's skin crawl and his lip draws over his teeth as his stomach tightens.

North chuckles, "It is natural reaction."

North hands the potion to Bunny who carefully cups it in his paws, the rabbit whispers words in a Pooka dialect. The potion glows like green grass and fresh leaves.

Tooth's wings flutter as she dips her slim fingers in. North holds a book out for her, circling scrambles of an ancient, powerful, language seem to burn from the pages.

Jack's muscles tense and freeze, his joints lock, and his blood stiffens in his veins.

I'm dieing, he thinks.

It doesn't hurt really, a quick sharp ache spreads before a numbness as he stops breathing and moving and hurting.

He feels the air shift around his ears but that might be his head falling back. Flashes of color, bright emeralds and zealant yellows, raincloud grey and snow whites, glittering golds decorating the spaces in between.

The world starts trembling but maybe that's just his body quivering.

Sudden bursts of feeling snap down his nerves and his jaw opens to scream.

His bones are breaking down and deteriorating, reforming themselves. The worst part is in the jaw and pelvis, collapsing inward and rebuilding out.

It stops and his chest arches, head tilting back. Fat drains while he's frozen, falling from his hips and chest. Muscle stitches over his arms and chest.

His crotch hurts.

Finally his back hits the hard flat surface and his head snaps up, a curling gas cloud escapes from his lips and he collapses, body limp and new.

He sleeps.

 

When he wakes his skin is sore. It feels like the fell from the sky, to a dumpster, to the cold, hard concrete, kind of sore. His muscles ache like he used every single one, like he made a storm out of fear and grief and rage. His crotch hurts like - well it's something he's never really felt before.

Sitting up he's sees he's alone in a room with an old full length mirror, rising from the bed he lets the wind from the open window drift him over.

His shoulders are broader, something barely noticeable. He's lean and flat and right.

His whole body buzzes with the correctness of his posture and the lack of femininity in his stance.

(He still has the grace of a wildcat and the tiny nesting birds but that's just his.)

He feels soft snowflakes and the wind rattles the windows lightly in his jubilation.

It's not something he can help, really, but the adrenaline and joy of it has him bursting out to his children. To Burgess.

He starts the softest, gentlest snow that he's ever been capable of creating. Children teem out of houses, adults stop for a moment, the creatures don't even bother to hide from its magic as it spreads and touches all with its joy.

His children laugh the laugh of fairies and sirens, making it easy to find the group.

He is Jack Frost, crowned with lilies to be Guardian of Fun, Shepherd of Winter.

"Jack!" They cry.

And he feels complete.

 

Extra: 

"Wow!" Is the first thing the shocked Tooth Fairy can say when Jack finally returns to the Santoff Clausen.

He doesn't know if the surprise is just because of how absolutely overjoyed he is or if maybe he just looks better when his physical form fits his mental one, happier, more comfortable.

Bunny is watching him with a smile while Sandy floats lazily around him. North looks entirely too self-satisfied.

"You look much happier!" North bellows out in his rough accent.

Bunny nods, "Everythin' in the right 'rder, mate?"

Jack giggles and nods, cradling his staff in his hands, the big grin never leaving his face.

"I feel right," he says, "a lot lighter. Freer."

Tooth can't take it anymore and crushes him in a hug, "We're so happy for you Jack!"

Jack's heart soars and he feels so bubbly like he's going to explode with light. His entire being is buzzing with energy and the Wind is howling with his jubilation.

Emotions well up along with this blinding joy, gratitude, at not being alone, at letting this happen, relief, at everything being right and the way they're supposed to be. It's like the years of lonely solitude can roll off his shoulders, like nothing could hurt anymore. He has choices now. He could go play all day with kids who adore him or hang out with the other guardians.

He feels happier than he ever has in his long, long life time.


End file.
